Cleanup begins at Tyre King

By DOUG McDONOUGH dmcdonough@hearstnp.com

Published 9:04 am, Monday, September 28, 2015

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Doug McDonough/Plainview Herald

A Tyre King truck-tractor is largely buried by a sea of junk tires at 34th and Wood. A district court judge in Travis County has ordered owner Santos Barcenas to remove all except 500 within six months.

To date, 40 11-ton truckloads of tires have been removed from the Tyre King Recycling facility at 34th and Wood, including 10 truckloads on Thursday alone. However, Coleman the 440 tons of tires removed to date hasn’t made a dent on the massive stockpile of car, truck and equipment tires that have been growing over the past decade.

“I’m not really sure how many tires are still out there there,” Coleman said Monday. “We’ve estimated at least a million, but it’s probably much more than that.”

The county has removed two tire-filled boxed trailers that were abandoned in the county right-of-way, and are storing them in Halfway until they can be sold at auction or scrapped. The county also has removed discarded tires in the right-of-way surrounding the property.

“While we now have authority from TECQ to allow people with proper authorization to remove tires, but we’re still awaiting a formal written statement from them giving us some guidelines,” Coleman said.

He noted that Tyre King owner Santos Alcantara Barcenas has several pending legal cases on a variety of criminal charges and civil issues. Barcenas was scheduled to appear Monday before 242nd District Court Judge Kregg Hukill on unrelated criminal charges while proceedings involved the tire recycling operation are being heard by a Travis County state district court.

“He’s been in default since 2009, but about all the state could do was keep writing him letters,” Coleman lamented Monday. The judge plans to draft a letter on behalf of Hale County asking State Rep. Ken King and State Sen. Charles Perry to support legislation giving state regulators more enforcement. “TCEQ tells us there are tire dumps all over the state, and some are worse than ours. We need to put so real teeth in the regulations where they have the authority to shut them down and have the owners facing criminal action if they don’t comply with their orders. What we have now is not enough.”

Admitting that the cleanup process will likely be long and expensive, Coleman said, “at least we are finally moving in a positive direction.”

In other action Monday, commissioners:

--Approved current accounts payable of $422,308.96 from the general account and $3,208.37 in reimbursements from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration grant. The closing balance on all accounts Aug. 31 was $16,900,199.52.

--Approved a resolution required by the Texas Department of Agriculture acknowledging that the county will provide $7,500 to funding in 2016 to Hale County Meals on Wheels, Inc. TDA requires a minimum local commitment of $1,541.50 to receive state funding for the program, based on the county’s estimated 6,166 senior residents.

--Authorized the hiring of Estevan Garcia in Precinct 1, Curtis Peterson in Precinct 4 and Jane Botello at the County Clerk’s Office.

--Approved the purchase of a Bush Hog shredder from JMS Equipment, at a cost of $18,900, for Precinct 1.

--Approved the purchase of a 2016 Ford crew cab 4-wheel-drive pickup for $43,511 from Bar W Ford in Tulia for Precinct 4.

--Tabled a request from Precinct 3 Justice of the Peace Karen Davis to spend $3,460 for a sprinkler system at her office, pending a well assessment by the High Plains Underwater Conservation District.

--Acknowledged that Hale County jail passed its annual state jail inspection on Sept. 17-18.

--Authorized Sheriff David Mull to distribute a request for proposals for repair or replacement of cell-door locks and related equipment.

--Approved polling locations for the Constitutional Amendments Election in November. Those locations will include the Ollie Liner Center, Technology Building at Hale Center, Petersburg City Hall and Abernathy City Hall.